


Yesterday's Tomorrow

by VagueJester



Category: Justice League - All Media Types, Supergirl (TV 2015)
Genre: Action/Adventure, Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, F/F, Family, Hurt/Comfort, Romance, Science Fiction, Slow Burn, Time Travel
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2021-01-02
Updated: 2021-02-07
Packaged: 2021-03-11 01:14:26
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 8
Words: 17,529
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28486668
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/VagueJester/pseuds/VagueJester
Summary: Inspired by The Shape of Things to Come by Argyle_SThe entire multiverse is on the brink of destruction in its war against Darkseid and Apokolips. With victory seemingly impossible, Kara Zor-El Danvers agrees to have her consciousness sent back in time to just before she landed on Earth. With decades of prior experience, Kara is determined to whatever she can to tip the odds in their favour, even if it means going through puberty for a second time.
Relationships: Alex Danvers/Kara Danvers
Comments: 27
Kudos: 210





	1. Arrival

**Author's Note:**

> As I mentioned in the summary, I was reading The Shape of Things to Come - an extremely good fic, by the way, definitely recommend you read it if you haven't already - and it involved Kara getting sent back to before she became Supergirl - which I found was interesting. However, I couldn't help but think about what if she got sent even further back. If she didn't have to worry about keeping up certain appearances, because it was all people knew of her. So this will be a part Canon rewrite, part AU involving a much more experienced Kara. I'd say OP, but she's a Super, they kinda already are.

It wasn't until she felt the sickening lurch of her pod being ripped from the Phantom Zone that Kara knew for sure she was still alive. The last thing she remembered was Zatanna donning the Helmet of Fate and grabbing M'gann's hand as they stood over her before a searing pain tore through her. The agony lasted a brief eternity until it disappeared without a trace, left alone in darkness and silence for an indeterminate amount of time, Kara hadn't even been sure if the information flashing through her mind came from the pod or her own memories. Wrenching her eyes open as the first specks of light became visible outside of her view port, Kara's hands flew over her controls. She already knew that her navigational controls had been slaved to Indigo as her pod dragged Fort Rozz out of the Phantom Zone with it, so she set about isolating as much of the onboard AI as she could, transferring it to a new data crystal while hacking into the profile codex her parents had installed for when she decided how she wanted to live on Earth. Forcing herself to keep breathing as her pod rumbled and shook, she activated the military profile and allowed the Trauma patch to be written into her genomes. It wasn't foolproof - especially considering the amount she had seen and experienced, but it would keep her from being overwhelmed in the face of what she had to do.

The AI crystal finished forming just as she passed Pluto, and Kara secured it around her neck before closing her eyes and attempting to meditate. Her stomach churned as she entered Earth's atmosphere, the flames around her pod reminding her far too much of the fires of war she had just left behind, and she comforted herself with the idea of seeing all those she cared about once more. It would be difficult meeting all her loved ones for the first time - especially considering that none of her relationships were going to be the same as they were the first time - but, at the very least, her strange behavior for the first few years could be passed off as her adapting to Earth and learning to live with the loss of her planet and people. Her heart still clenched when Kal-El wrenched open her pod and spoke in halting, heavily accented, and broken Kryptonese. She was more sympathetic to his plight of having a fourteen year old super alien suddenly falling into his life, but it didn't do much to ease the sharp pain in her chest when, after a week in his small apartment in Metropolis, he informed her that he was going to take her to live with some friends of his who would be able to provide for her the type of life he couldn't.

Kara's faith had helped carry her through more than a few extremely tough times during the Lantern Wars and then again in the war against Darkseid. Perhaps that was why, even now, it hurt so much to see Kal, her cousin, not work harder to stay with her. 

Her heart shattered all over again when they arrived at the Danvers' home and she was harshly reminded of how little Alex cared for her in the beginning. Alex was one of the last free humans to fall against Darkseid, leading a battalion of various aliens and meta-humans in a raid that destroyed the last of Darkseid's supply of Father Boxes. Her death had been what finally made Kara agree to be sent back in time, as, even if they somehow, miraculously, won, she had no desire to live without the one person who had always been there for her. Friends, sisters, lovers, Kara and Alex had always been there for each other in whatever way they needed, and now, looking into those big brown eyes as she glared down at her from her bedroom window, Kara allowed herself to feel the maelstrom of emotions swirling around her as Jeremiah hesitantly wrapped his arms around her.

Because that truly was the crux of everything. Alex had given up everything for years to protect and care for Kara, only to die in a war against the most dangerous being any of them had ever imagined. Kara couldn't even begin to repay what Alex Danvers had done for her over the years, but she was determined to try. She would cross time and space, fight never-ending wars, and burn her soul in Rao's light if it had a chance of creating a world where Alex would get the happiness she deserved. To do that, though, she had to stick to the plan she, M'gann, and Zatanna had come up with aboard the Waverider. She barely acknowledged Kal leaving, and allowed herself to be directed to the room next to Alex's, nodding along with whatever Jeremiah and Eliza were saying before closing the door behind her and taking a seat on her old, childhood bed. She crossed her legs and closed her eyes, allowing memories of a happier time to chase away the last of her heartbreak, and listened to the other three moving through the house until they eventually settled down to sleep. Once she was sure she wouldn't be discovered, she gently opened her window and floated out, breathing deeply before rocketing East with barely a sound.

She kept low to the ground, and stuck to sub-sonic speeds as much as she could to avoid any unwanted surveillance until she eventually caught the familiar smell of smog filling her nostrils, and she found herself hovering above the gothic, gloomy streets of Gotham City. Spreading her senses, she picked her way through the sights and smells and sounds, zooming between tall, imposing buildings towards her target. She paused in midair and watched as he ruthlessly took down a group of thugs near a harbor - darting in and out of the shadows, preying on their fear. His technique was flawless, if a bit unrefined from the lack of experience, and she waited until he had knocked the last of them out and was grappling to a nearby rooftop before she floated over, making sure to appear as non-threatening as a strange, flying teenager could.

"Excuse me, Mister Wayne?"

Batman jerked and she ignored the batarangs he flung at her as they bounced harmlessly off her chest, holding her arms about in front of her to show she meant no harm.

"Who are you?" He demanded, hand still over his utility belt as he eyed her suspiciously. Kara could hear his heart racing and smell the pheromones he was producing and made sure not to look smug about the fact that she had managed to frighten the legendary Batman.

Taking a deep breath, Kara steeled herself. "My name is Kara Zor-El. I need your help."

"Why have you come here?" Batman growled.

"You know of Superman, yes?" Kara asked. He nodded so she continued. "He is my cousin."

"That doesn't answer my question."

"No," Kara shook her head. "But I need your trust, and the only way to earn it is to not withhold any information, no matter how dangerous or seemingly irrelevant."

Batman shifted ever so slightly. He was curious. "Go on."

"Though I appear younger, Kal-El and I fled the destruction of Krypton mere moments apart. I was supposed to care for him and help him adapt to life on Earth, but, while I only left moments after he did, my pod was was knocked off course by the destruction of our planet and into what we called the Phantom Zone - a pocket dimension outside of regular time." She then explained everything that led up to her pod landing on Earth, including Fort Rozz and her Aunt Astra.

"Why are you telling me this?" He asked. "And how do you know my identity?"

"Because, while I've explained how my body wound up here, my mind is a different matter entirely," Kara replied. "Though I currently have the body of a girl no more than fourteen or fifteen of your Earth years, frozen and sent from destruction nearly twenty-five years in the past, my mind has come back from nearly seventy years along my own timeline."

"You're a time traveler," he stated, and Kara had to applaud his stoicism in the face of such a ridiculous claim.

"Of a sort," Kara conceded. "Only my memories and consciousness were sent back. As I said, the Phantom Zone exists outside of the regular flow of time, so it provided a nexus through which to send myself without simply creating a branching reality."

"Even if I believed you," Batman said, and Kara could practically taste the skepticism in his voice. "That doesn't explain why you're telling me and not your supposed cousin."

"There's a war coming," Kara announced, her shoulders squaring with the seriousness of a soldier. "The bloodiest, most violent and terrible war ever seen, and it will threaten all life along every known universe. This far back along my own personal timeline, however, the information I have is bound to be useless strategically by the time it arrives. You are one of the greatest tacticians I have ever met, and you are the most capable of understanding why certain information has to remain a secret until the right time. For that reason, our plan only had one step: find you."

Bruce Wayne looked into this young girl's eyes and knew she was telling the truth. There was unimaginable pain and loss in her eyes, and her demeanor was a mix of the awkwardness of a teenager not yet used to their body, and the unyielding strength of a warrior forged in fire. His mind made up, he nodded and accepted the almost kindred spirit floating in front of him.

"Tell me everything."


	2. First Impressions

Kara only made it back to the Danvers' just as the sun was rising. Bruce Wayne was not, by any stretch of the imagination, a therapist of any sort, but simply unloading what she could in the time she had felt good. He didn't interrupt or ask questions, and had taken careful notes on everything - even when she got lost in memory and would start rambling off on a tangent. The whole experience left her feeling a little lighter, and left her focused on her more personal - yet no less important - mission: making sure Alex got the childhood she deserved.

She watched from the roof of the house as Alex snuck out with her surfboard, running on gangly legs towards the beach. Her first memory of Alex was actually of her being scolded by Eliza for sneaking out and not helping Kara to adjust on her first day with them. This time, Kara floated over the cliff and down to the beach, sitting herself in the sand against the rocks, and watched as Alex sliced through the waves, an all-too-rare expression of carefree bliss on her face. An hour and a half passed and the sky grew brighter before Alex returned to shore, her lips slightly blue from the cold, and her eyebrows furrowing in displeasure as she spotted Kara.

"What are you doing here?" She spat. Kara flinched at the venom in her tone, but smiled through it. "You looked beautiful as you rode the waves. It gave me something to focus on so that I wouldn't keep seeing through things."

Alex flushed a brilliant red and Kara grinned as she looked away, sputtering and muttering to the sand between her toes. "Well, uh. . . thanks, I guess."

Kara shook her head and stood up, grabbing one of Alex's hands in her own and rubbing some warmth back into it. "I should be the one thanking you. It was not fair of my. . . of Kal-El to leave me here, nor of anyone else to expect you to abandon your life to look after me. I will do everything in my power to ease that burden and let you know how. . . appreciated you are."

Alex gaped at the heartfelt words the strange alien girl was saying and felt her chest tighten. She cleared her throat, still unable to look Kara in the eye. "Yeah, well, it's not like I have much of a choice."

Kara faltered, and seemed to be struggling to say something before taking a deep breath and steeling her nerves. "Could you... tell me about yourself? If we are to live together, I would like to be your. . . " She said something in a strange, humming language that Alex realized must have been Kryptonian.

"What does that mean?"

Kara flushed and Alex was reminded of a sunset. "I. . . That is. . . there is no word in any of the languages I have learned on your planet. On Krypton, it is a word for one who. . . " Her face became an even deeper shade of red and Alex was suddenly intrigued. "I'm sorry, I have intruded in your home, you do not know me, I shouldn't have said it. Perhaps a better word would be 'friend'?"

Ever since her parents had told her Kara would be coming to live with them she had hated her. All day, every day, it always seemed to be 'Kara this', 'Kara that', 'We need to get ready for when Kara gets here', 'don't forget that you'll have to look after Kara', and when the downright angelic girl landed on their front lawn alongside _Superman,_ Alex just knew that her parents were going to forget about her. How couldn't they? Alex had barely spoken to her for ten minutes and already she knew that Kara was sweet and quiet and gentle, everything Alex was sure her parents wished she was. She wanted so badly to hate her, but as she started to talk about her surfing and Kara listened attentively, she found it harder and harder. By the time they got home, Alex had moved on to her budding fascination with marine biology, and was describing to Kara how strange some of the things she had learned lived under the ocean were when her mom came running over from where she had been pacing on the porch, her dad hanging back with a cup of coffee in his hands.

"There you are!" Mom yelled, and Alex's anger and jealousy barely had a chance to rear its head when Kara stepped back and avoided being caught in a hug, bowing at the waist with one of her hands in a fist and pressed against her chest.

"Everything is all right, Eliza Danvers," she called out, avoiding Mom's eye. "Your daughter wanted to go surfing, but was reluctant to leave me to adjust to your planet on my own. I assured her, though, that as a Daughter of House El, I would be able to train my new abilities while protecting her from predators."

Mom pulled up short and Alex felt like her jaw was going to unhinge. Kara was outright lying to her mom in order to save her from getting in trouble. "Oh, well. . ." Mom spluttered, and Alex could hear Dad snickering in the background. "Thank you, Kara, but that's really not necessary. . ."

Kara tilted her head, as if she couldn't wrap her mind around what Mom had just said. "Was it not appropriate? I heard you assign Alex as my. . . protector? I do not know from what I need protecting, but when I lay awake during the night, lost in visions of Rao's fury, Alex's heart guided me back. I do not know how I can help bring glory to your house under Sol, but her blessings have made me powerful. So long as Alex is with me, no harm will come to her."

Alex's heart was racing. The depth of pain and loneliness in Kara's eyes shattered what was left of her defenses, and any lingering bitterness melted away. Kara hadn't even known her a day, but seemed to have this unshakeable faith in her, and, rather than be intimidated or annoyed by the pressure that put on her, Alex felt confident, as if she could do anything. Mom looked lost for words, but Dad stood up and walked down from the porch, kneeling in front of Kara and wrapping his arms around her gently.

"Thank you, Kara," he said, pulling away. "We asked a lot of Alex when we agreed to have you come live with us, we appreciate that you're there for her as well."

Kara shifted in place, her prior confidence gone. She nodded sheepishly and Alex's parents went back inside the house.

"You lied to my parents."

Kara nodded, her face red. "Merely about your departure. I did not want them upset with you. Everything else was true."

"You really feel that way because of my heartbeat?"

"Was. . . was I too forward?" She asked uncertainly, and now _Alex_ wanted to wrap her in a hug.

She shrugged. "It's flattering, I guess? Now come on, if you're gonna be living among us humans, you gotta learn how to talk like a regular person and not some old-timey lord or something."


	3. Explanations

In the month since Kara had come to live with them, Alex’s theory about her parents wanting to ruin her life seemed more and more likely. Vicki Donahue had finally noticed Alex after they were partnered together for a biology assignment, and the two of them had started to bond over their mutual love of surfing. Alex’s parents though, kept trying to get her to stay home, or at least bring Kara along whenever Vicki and the other popular kids invited her to hang out down at the beach. To Alex’s surprise, though, it was Kara who always came to her defence, stating that she had come to understand that humans were a far more social species than Kryptonians and, once Dad had let her use a computer, had pulled out article after article on the importance of social development for human adolescents.

Kara spent most of her time reading. She had torn through every book in the Danvers house within the first week, and spent hours on the internet once Dad let her. If she wasn’t busy trying to absorb the sum total of knowledge, she was outside or by one of the windows basking in the sun. Alex would wake up some mornings and find Kara already up and outside kneeling or floating before the rising sun, mumbling under her breath before accompanying Alex down to the beach for a morning swim. Mom and Dad tried to get her to stop using her powers, afraid some government agent or secret lab or something would come and take her away, but Kara was nothing if not stubborn, especially when she started showing far better control than Mom said Superman ever had. 

In spite of what Alex was led to believe to be astounding progress, her parents still didn’t want to leave Kara alone for any period of time. More than once she had simply wandered off, some animal or strange sight catching her attention unless someone was around to remind her to stay home. So, when Vicki and Alex stopped by her place to get ready before heading to the beach, and ran into Mom on her way out the door, Alex had no choice but to bring Kara along. The entire bike ride down to the coast was tense as Alex and Vicki tried to ignore Kara trailing behind them, a thick textbook on quantum physics pressed against her chest. By the time she had paddled out with Vicki and the other kids, she had nearly managed to forget about her, until Mike Hudson paddled over, the sun shining off his blonde hair. Every girl she talked to had a crush on Mike, but Alex couldn’t for the life of her see why, especially with the gross wisps of hair starting to sprout from his chin.

“So, Danvers, is that the kid your parents decided to adopt?”

“Yeah,” Alex replied. “Her parents and mine were friends or something.”

“She some kind of loner, or something?” Another of the kids, Jason, asked.

“My dad said he saw her talking to that weird homeless dude downtown,” Vicki added.

“That one with all those nasty scars by the mall?” Mike said.

Vicki laughed and Alex felt something in her gut twist. “Yeah, he saw her giving him something and talking in a weird foreign language.” Normally, when Vicki smiled, Alex felt all warm and she got butterflies in her stomach, but when she turned to grin at her this time, Alex just felt cold. “Hey, Alex, do your parents know they adopted a junkie?”

“I doubt she would be buying drugs,” Alex muttered. “It. . . it goes against her religion, or whatever.”

“She some kinda Muslim or something?” Mike asked.

Alex shrugged.

“You think her parents blew themselves up?” Jason added, and the others laughed until Mike fell off his board, only making them laugh harder. Alex, though, turned to look back at the small dot she knew was Kara sitting against the cliff face. Alex, like everyone else, knew what had happened to Krypton, and she also knew that Kara could hear exactly what they were all saying but was unable to do anything about it without exposing herself.

Anger unlike anything Alex had ever felt before swept through her, and she turned around paddling furiously back to shore.

“Alex?” Vicki called. “Where are you going?”

The others followed her, and once Alex had her feet firmly on the ground, she spun around and punched Jason in the jaw.

“OW! What the hell?!” The boy shrieked from where he had tumbled to the ground.

“Her parents didn’t blow themselves up,” Alex snarled. “They  _ got  _ blown up! Protecting her.”

“Jeez, calm down, Alex, it was just a joke,” Mike said angrily stepping in front of her. He had a good four inches on Alex, and had gained quite a bit of muscle since joining the football team. Alex didn’t care though, she wanted nothing more than to hit him when a soft hand wrapped around her wrist and pulled her gently away. She turned around and saw Kara smiling at her, urging her back towards her bike, and sighed, grabbing her things on the way.

“I’m outta here,” she muttered angrily. She and Kara walked in silence for several minutes before Kara decided to speak.

“Thank you.”

Alex huffed. “He deserved it.”

“You know, if that other one had tried to hurt you back, I would have thrown him into the moon,” Kara remarked, as if she were simply commenting on the weather.

“What?” Alex squawked.

“Well, maybe not him,” Kara amended. “But if he were Krytponian, or, you know, something else. . . I’d’ve kicked his butt.”

It still shocked Alex just how much Kara seemed to care so much for her. Every day Alex would get home from school and find Kara waiting for her on the porch. She would ask Alex about her day and would listen with rapt attention as Alex rambled on about her classes, or what Vicki had said that made her laugh, or what she had done during her free period, or if Vicki was looking particularly pretty that day (she never mentioned the whispers that followed her down the hall, or the pitying looks the teachers gave her). Sometimes, though, if she thought she wasn’t looking, Kara would look at her with so much emotion that Alex had trouble breathing. Her blue eyes would shine and Alex would want nothing more than to hug her.

“I’m pretty sure Mom would kill me if she found out I let you throw a kid at the moon.” Alex snorted. “Even if he deserved it.”

“Well, tough,” Kara huffed, a pout the entire Danvers household had quickly realised would doom them all should it ever fall into the wrong hands on her face. “You’re my  _ Rao’zheik, _ I won’t let anyone hurt you.”

That was the other thing that intrigued Alex. Kara had obstinately refused to address her as sister, even when she acknowledged Mom and Dad as her foster parents. At first it had stung (though Alex would never admit it), but Kara had explained that it wasn’t from a lack of care, rather the fact that Alex just wasn’t Kara’s sister. She was  _ Rao’zheik _ , which a call to Superman (and she still couldn’t believe that her parents could just, like,  _ call _ Superman whenever they wanted) had told them that the nearest English translation for it was ‘light holder’.

Alex scoffed. “That’d go over well. I’m pretty sure she still thinks it’s just some kind of nickname or something. I’m still supposed to be the one looking out for you, and I wouldn’t really be doing a good job of that if I let you expose yourself like that.”

Kara bristled, and Alex couldn’t deny that she enjoyed watching her get agitated in her defence. “Nickname,” she grumbled, her pout in full force as she crossed her arms. “Rao strengthen me, you humans need to hurry up and develop better senses of smell.”

Alex raised an eyebrow and laughed at the absurd comment. “What does that have to do with anything?”

Kara sighed and a blush lit up her cheeks. “There was a. . . theory on Krypton, that a race hadn’t truly reached the height of their evolution until they had developed beyond the limits of verbal communication.”

“Really?” Alex asked, her curiosity piqued. “But language is, like, the building block of modern society.”

“And how many times have you heard sayings like ‘being speechless’, or ‘don’t have the words to describe’?” Kara countered. “Some races could read minds to supplement verbal communication, others, like my people, developed along a more biological route.”

“What do you mean?”

“We produce a wider range of pheromones than humans, and have a better control over their potency,” Kara explained. “Our eyes refract light and change colour beyond your visible spectrum, and we have additional vocal nodes as well.”

“That’s so cool,” Alex mumbled, fascinated. “Does it only work with other Kryptonians?”

Kara shook her head, smiling. “You can’t detect it, but your hormones make slight changes to your sweat, and I can smell them. It doesn’t have nearly the range of mine, but it at least helps me know if you’re happy, or sad, or scared.”

“Is that why you have trouble translating certain words?” Kara nodded and Alex felt giddy. “We have to tell my dad this when he gets home. It’ll blow his mind.” She paused, thinking over what Kara had just said. “Wait, so you can change your eye colour whenever you want?”

Kara flushed and kicked at the ground. “It’s actually been one of the hardest things to. . . suppress.”

“Can. . . can I see?”

Kara closed her eyes and took a deep breath before opening them, and Alex gasped. Her normally bright blue eyes were ringed in a gorgeous, deep purple light. It wasn’t blinding or anything, but it very clearly wasn’t human, and Alex felt a pang of sympathy as she realised that, despite looking human at first glance, Kara had to suppress even her basic biology just to fit in. No wonder she got annoyed whenever they chastised her for using her powers.

“They’re beautiful,” she whispered, and a curl of orange wound its way through the violet glow before Kara closed her eyes and took several more deep breaths. “How come we never heard of Sup - er, your cousin doing anything like that?”

“Where do you think our heat vision comes from?” Kara asked. She looked heartbroken as she turned to stare at the sky. “Kal came here as a baby, he’s Kryptonian in biology, but he doesn’t know what it means to really  _ be  _ a child of Krypton. He’s never felt Rao’s light on his face, or heard the wind through the singing towers of Tranor. He was the first child to be born naturally in generations, so he doesn’t know what it feels like to be in the matricomp’s embrace, or be given the imprint of his House in his very genomes.” A tear slipped down her cheek, glittering in the sun. “We both lost our futures when Krypton was destroyed, but I’m the one who will have to carry our pasts as well.”

Alex stepped forward and wrapped her arms around Kara’s waist. “I’m here for you,” she whispered. “And. . . if you ever feel like sharing that past, I’d love to learn.”

Kara smiled and returned the embrace. “Thank you.”

After that, Alex no longer dreaded her mom telling her to hang around with Kara. The two of them became inseparable, spending all their time together. The only time they were apart was when Alex was at school. She had gotten into quite a few more fights with the other kids over things they said about Kara, and each time she came home with a new bruise or a busted lip, Kara would gently tend to it, before kissing her cheek. She would then show Alex what she had done that day while practicing with her powers, while asking about the rest of her time at school.

They would bicker and fight on occasion, but it always ended with one or both of them dissolving into fits of laughter. Kara had this strange ability to put everything into perspective and calm them both down so they could talk about whatever was on their mind at the time. The closest she ever came to real anger was when Dad killed a spider and she ranted about the sanctity of life for thirty minutes, arms waving frantically as she unknowingly started floating back and forth (a frankly hilarious sight, as she was still pacing back and forth six inches off the ground) and descending into Kryptonese before Alex managed to calm her down. Mom had then explained to Alex that she would clearly need to help keep Kara calm, as they couldn’t risk her losing control like that in public.

That had clearly been the wrong thing to say, as Kara’s eyes had begun to glow red and her breathing shaky before she shouted something in Kryptonese and flew out the door. That night, Dad received reports that a large meteor had slammed into the surface of Mars. It wasn’t until Kara reappeared the next morning, sniveling and feverish as she croaked out an apology before almost collapsing in bed that they pieced together just what had happened.

Kara had spent nearly a week in bed, miserable and exhausted, and Alex’s parents didn’t know what to do. They called Superman, and he informed them that she must have just blown out her powers and they would come back after enough exposure to sunlight but her immune system was as weak as a newborn’s until then. Alex’s parents, not really knowing what to do, had retreated to their lab in the basement while Alex herself took care of the sick, delirious alien.

“I’m sorry,” Kara whimpered over and over, tears streaming down her face. “Please, Alex, don’t leave me.”

“I’m not going to leave you, Kara,” Alex whispered, running her hands through Kara’s hair.

“You - you gave up so much for me,” Kara moaned. “The DEO, Maggie. . . I just want you back. I came back for you.  _ Please. _ ”

“I’m right here, Kara,” she whispered. “I’ve got you.”

“It’s just so much,” Kara said. “I thought I could come back, and we’d have  _ years _ . And I know I need to prepare, but. . . but I-I thought, while we were still kids, at least. . . but I know what’s coming, and I know you’re going to leave, and every time she yells at you, I know you’re going to blame me, and I can’t do it, Alex. I  _ can’t _ . I can’t keep fighting without you by my side. I have Bruce, but it’s not enough. It’s never enough without you.”

Alex had no idea what Kara was talking about, but she just kept petting her hair humming as Kara sobbed into her stomach. She had no clue what the DEO was, or who this Maggie or Bruce were, but she knew that Kara was hurting, badly. She was drenched in sweat and big, ugly tears were trailing down her cheeks as Alex held her close. The beginnings of an idea started forming in the back of her head as she soothed Kara, and she couldn’t help but dwell on it over the next few days as Kara tossed and turned in her bed, mumbling nonsense.

On the fifth day, Kara’s fever broke, and Alex allowed herself to relax slightly. She had been staying home from school, and, once she had made sure that Kara was fast asleep with bottles of water and buckets in case of emergency, had finished her homework, she took a deep breath and gathered her courage before marching downstairs to where her dad was working away in her parents’ private lab, plugging data into a massive computer while her mom was at work.

“Dad?” She called out cautiously.

Dad lifted his head and looked around in a fog for a second before spotting her and shaking his head with a smile. “Hey, Alex, what’s up?”

“Can I talk to you?” She asked. “It’s about Kara.”

Dad pulled his chair away from his desk and grabbed another one for her to sit in. “Sure thing, Lexie. You know, your mom and I are really proud of how you’ve been there for her lately.”

Alex blushed and smiled at the ground. “She makes it hard not to care,” she mumbled. “Her fever finally broke and I wanted to ask you something kinda. . . crazy?”

“Well,” Dad said, sitting back in his chair with his arms open. “I’m a pretty big fan of crazy. Whaddya got?”

“The place where Kara was trapped. . . the Phantom Zone? She said it was outside of time, right?”

Dad nodded, a far away look in his eye. “Yup. From how Kal described it, twenty-four years passed out here while Kara was in there, sleeping for who knows how long.”

“What if. . . what if she wasn’t?” Alex asked.

Dad frowned. “I’m not sure what you mean, Honey.”

“When Kara’s fever got really bad, she started talking about stuff,” Alex explained awkwardly. “She mentioned things and people I’ve never heard of like we should both know what they are.”

“She was delirious, Sweetheart,” Dad replied. “She wasn’t thinking straight, maybe even hallucinating.”

“So you’ve never heard of the DEO then?” Alex asked, and her father stiffened. “You have,” she whispered before he could deny it.

“Only once or twice from Superman,” Dad explained. “He thinks they’re some sort of government agency that captures aliens. I have no idea how Kara would know about it.”

“She thought I worked for them,” Alex continued. “And she kept apologising, saying that she came back for me. Dad. . . I know it sounds completely bonkers, but. . . if that Phantom Zone existed outside of time, do you think Kara might have seen. . . something?”

“You think she caught glimpses of the future?” Dad asked.

“It would explain why she seemed to like me so much despite being shy with everyone else,” Alex reasoned. “If she saw glimpses of a future where we’re together, then maybe. . . that, I dunno, carried over, or something.”

“It would also explain her quick grasp of her powers,” Dad added. “It took us years to help Kal-El master his, but Kara seems to already have a firm grasp on them.” He turned back to his computer and started typing frantically. “This could change everything we understand about space-time! Think about it, Lexie, we could expand into the stars farther than ever before and be back in time for dinner!”

Alex couldn’t help but feel a similar tingle of excitement at the idea of unraveling that kind of mystery, but one of the last things Kara had muttered before finally dropping off to sleep grounded her as she reached out to grab her dad’s arm. “Dad, she mentioned  _ wars. _ As in more than one. If. . . if she came back -”

“She’s likely far more traumatized than we thought,” Dad finished. He looked at his computer with a conflicted expression before sighing and running a hand over his face. “You were right, Kiddo, this  _ is  _ crazy. We’re talking science fiction here, and I think we’ve both seen enough Doctor Who to know what kind of things can go wrong when you mess with time travel.”

“So, what do we do?” Alex asked. “She seems so. . . sad, and scared.”

“First, we don’t know if this is actually the case,” Dad said, holding out a finger. “But, if, for an absolutely crazy moment, we believed it was, then you can’t ask her about it.”

“But -” Dad silenced her with a look and her teeth clacked as her mouth snapped shut.

“No spoilers, Alex,” he ordered. “On top of whatever potential ramifications or paradoxes they would cause, if Kara really has lived through what you think she has, then we can’t push her. We have to support her, no matter what. If she decides she wants to share with us, then we’ll be there for her.” He sighed and ran a hand through his hair. “It would explain why she doesn’t seem to care at all about fitting in.”

“I don’t think she’ll expose herself without a good reason,” Alex offered. “She mentioned that she wanted to be with me while we were still kids, before she had to prepare. . .”

“Well, that’s something, I guess,” Dad conceded. He looked at her for a long, quiet minute before coming to a conclusion. “Alex, would you be okay if we enrolled Kara in the same grade as you? Even if we’re completely wrong about this, your mom and I still really appreciate you being there for her, and she is adjusting faster than expected.”

Alex blinked. Even before Kara had gotten sick she would have had a hard time answering that question, but after holding her as she sobbed and sniffled and slept, Alex wanted nothing more than to protect the angelic alien that had suddenly crashed into her life. “No, I guess it would be fine. I could help her get used to classes and everything without missing any of my own.”

Dad smiled his ‘I’m so proud of you’ smile, and Alex blushed, rolling her eyes. The two of them went upstairs and started making food, discussing the possible uses of time travel and how a dimension outside of time could even exist when Kara floated down, bleary eyed and sleepy just before Mom got home. They were all gathered in the living room eating and watching TV when the power went out and a menacing voice rumbled from their television set.

_ “You are not alone.” _

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> There we go, now I'm starting to feel like I found my groove. So, I thought I'd have some fun and try to explain a bit of just why Kryptonians have things like heat vision and enhanced senses, so hopefully you like it. I liked the idea of the whole time travel thing being a bit of an open secret, as I didn't want to deal with the drama and distrust that normally come with it being covered up. The kid stuff is tough at times to write, so I'm still just experimenting with where I want the story to go. Anyway, hopefully you liked it, and tell me what you think in the comments below!  
> TTFN


	4. Changes

Kara was remarkably lucky that humans and kryptonians looked so alike. Fitting in when she had first arrived had been hard enough when the only visible difference between her and other humans had been her eyes. She had learned rather quickly, though, that prejudice towards anything ‘monstrous’ in appearance existed pretty much everywhere in the multiverse.

During the War of Lights, Kara and her team had responded to a distress call from a platoon of Purple Lanterns that had come under attack from creatures native to the moon on which they were supposed to be providing aid to refugees. They had arrived on the moon to find the Lanterns fighting against a race of massive, spider-like creatures whom they said had captured a child in their webs.

As it had turned out, though, even beings powered by the violet light of love were subject to prejudice. The creatures, Ykdomnians, were a pre-spaceflight culture who had been curious about the beings that had crashed in their forests and had saved the child from being devoured by the carnivorous plants that grew there. Their culture had grown from their ability to weave webs and slice through them with their claws, resulting in a love of anything to do with fabric. 

Near the end of the War of Lights, Kara and Alex had chosen to take some time off there and the Ykdomnians had celebrated their stay with gifts of clothing stronger than any armor the two of them had ever worn. They had also fashioned the dress and suit Kara and Alex had respectively worn when they finally went through with the Kryptonian bonding ritual after the war had finished. It was one of the few good memories Kara had before Darkseid began his siege on all of existence, and was why she had suddenly started yelling at Jeremiah when he grabbed a shoe and crushed a spider she had been watching as it crawled along the wall.

She hadn’t been fully aware of where she was or what she was doing as she reamed him out, but she felt a comforting touch on her arm and that all-too-familiar smell filled her with the beginnings of peace until Eliza scolded Alex and something snapped. Her eyes were burning, and she knew she had to get out of there before her heat vision went off accidentally.

_ “She’s my partner!”  _ Kara had shouted in Kryptonese.  _ “Not some leash for you to control me!”  _ Without stopping, she had flown out of the house and was well outside of Earth’s atmosphere before she even knew what she was doing. She needed to vent, so she flew towards Mars and unleashed herself upon the cold and barren rock. She didn’t mean to have a solar flare but didn’t think too much of it as her flight gave out on the porch of the Danvers’ house. She had learned that her body’s ability to absorb sunlight and undergo the Photonucleic Effect grew every time she blew out her powers, making her stronger as a result, but she had not been prepared for the week of hell that followed as her adolescent immune system did not have nearly the strength of her old one. 

She was grateful that Alex had stayed by her side the entire time, and when her fever finally broke, her powers just starting to return, she had grabbed a blanket and floated downstairs to cuddle with her when Zod’s invasion began. The sound of his voice through the television was the jolt of adrenaline she had needed to fully jump start her powers, and she had sat frozen in the living room with Alex as her cousin fought to save the world.

Kal’s battle with Zod’s forces near Smallville was so powerful, so earth-shaking in its ferocity, Kara could hear it all the way across the country. She sat in the Danvers’ living room and listened as her cousin fought one of the most dangerous and legendary generals to ever come from Krypton. In her original timeline, their final battle was the stuff of myths; two gods from a different world clashing in the ultimate test of wills and strength. Superman may have already been flying around saving the day for eight months, but his battle against the invading Kryptonians cemented his place in history as a symbol of hope and champion of Earth.

That didn’t stop Kara from clenching her eyes shut and trying to ignore the thousands of lives being snuffed out by Zod’s world engines. She had warned Bruce well ahead of time and he had done what he could to evacuate the surrounding areas, the two of them agreeing that this was probably one of the only events from the timeline that they would be able to make a significant impact on before the Butterfly Effect changed too many things.It was a tense day and a half, filled with violence and death, and Kara groaned as she felt the shifts in Earth’s gravity, but rose her feet as first Kal destroyed one of the world engines in the southern hemisphere, and then the humans destroyed the other above Metropolis.

The entire planet was silent. A quiet encompassed the Earth so great, Kara could actually hear Zod screaming as the last world engine was destroyed and took his troops with it. Before she knew what was happening, she was in the air, and had made it to the massive crater on the edge of Metropolis just as the dust was settling. The entire world knew of Kal’s fight with Zod, footage of two specks blasting through the air, firing beams of light and toppling buildings had been seen the world over, but only one person could claim to have actually seen anything substantial before Earth’s champion nearly flattened half the remaining structures in his own city and cost hundreds more lives in collateral damage.

Spotting Zod kneeling among the wreckage, Kara swooped down.

“It’s gone,” he muttered. “My ship, my soldiers. . .  _ Krypton. _ It’s all gone.”

Kara neglected to mention the prison ship in the California desert with thirty battle-ready Kryptonians waiting to see how this panned out. “Krypton had its chance for redemption long ago, Dru-Zod,” Kara replied, her voice steady.

“Who are you to decide Krypton’s fate?” Zod challenged. “Everything I do -  _ my very existence  _ \- was for my home! Who are you to deny me my birthright,  _ girl _ ?!”

Kara stood firm as he rose to his feet. The first time around, she had been curled up with the Danvers, still unable to control her powers and terrified that Zod would kill Kal and then come for her. Not this time. “In a previous life, I was the daughter of Zor-El and Alura In-Ze, niece to General Astra In-Ze, regent of the Great House of El, and last daughter of Krypton. But I was also trapped in the Phantom Zone, frozen for years in that darkness, until I escaped through Rao’s grace, and burdened with the task of hunting those who cower from His light.”

Zod scoffed. “ _ You  _ would take up the noble mantle of Nightwing? I stand in His glory, trying to bring back what we lost, and you  _ dare  _ accuse me -”

Kara didn’t let him finish, shattering the sound barrier as she suddenly appeared over Zod, slamming his head into the ground. Not letting go of him, she dragged him skyward, punching him hard enough for the resounding booms to catch the humans’ attention and mistake her for her cousin. She never gave him a chance to counter, her own heat vision burning hotter than Kal’s as she sliced three of his fingers off when he tried. The two of them continued to climb and climb until they neared the edge of Earth’s atmosphere, at which point Kara delivered a power kick to his gut and wrapped herself around him before dragging him back down. Her clothes were reduced to ash on their re-entry, and shockwave from their impact rattled windows in Gotham. Zod was barely conscious as she hauled him up and Kal and Lois Lane were watching, stunned, until she wrapped her arms around his neck.

“Kara, no!” Kal shouted, speeding towards her, but he was too late. With a vicious snarl, Kara used all her strength to wrench Zod’s neck to the side, breaking it with another loud boom. She shot her cousin a cool look, and made sure Lois was within earshot. “This world needs you to protect it, Kal-El.” She then took off and was outside of Wayne Manor in no time at all.

“Miss Zor-El,” Alfred greeted. “It’s a relief to see you are well.”

“I’ve fought things far stronger than Dru-Zod, Alfred,” Kara replied, smiling tightly.

“Perhaps I could find you something to wear, then?” Alfred offered.

Kara looked down at her naked self, her necklace with the Kryptonian data crystal the only thing that had survived her re-entry into the atmosphere at such high speeds, and nodded. “Thank you, Alfred.”

“If you’re here, then I take it he’s dead?” Bruce asked, appearing as if from nowhere in a suit that probably cost more than Jeremiah made in a year. 

“He is,” Kara replied.

Bruce’s eyes narrowed and he tossed Kara a small device no larger than the palm of her hand. “Here,” he said coolly. “Built exactly to your specifications.”

“And you’re the only one with the kill codes?” Kara asked, waiting until he nodded before raising the device to her necklace. The data crystal recognised the foreign technology and shifted to implant itself into it, merging the two. She could feel Bruce’s eyes on her as Alfred returned with an oversized t-shirt that might as well have been a dress. “Spare me the judgmental look, Bruce. I’m not one of your kids. I had to let go of my morals a long time ago, Bruce, but I’m aware of the danger I can cause others. That’s why you’re the one with the kill code for the kryptonite inhibitor.”

Bruce didn’t reply, but he did look somewhat uncomfortable as Alfred said what was probably on his mind. “Are you sure this is necessary, Miss Zor-El?”

“You were a soldier as well, weren’t you, Alfred?” Kara asked.

Alfred’s expression became distant and grave as he nodded. “I was, and I am well aware of the toll it can take on one’s mind. But to plan for such a thing. . .”

“I’ve lost my mind more than once, Alfred,” Kara explained. “I’ve been captured, tortured, experimented on, brainwashed, seen friends die, killed others. . . the list goes on. The genomes from the Military Guild that I activated help, but only one person was ever able to pull me back, and that was Alex. Except she’s not equipped to do that right now - she might never be. With this inhibitor, one of the only weaknesses my people have won’t work on me, so I need someone to have a contingency should I start to lose it.”

“You remind me of myself when I was younger,” Bruce muttered, looking up at a portrait of his parents hanging on the wall.

“Excuse you,” Kara teased, trying to lighten the mood. “I’m well over eighty. You’re the inexperienced youngster here.”

“I certainly hope I can look that good when I’m eighty,” Alfred added.

Kara smiled. “Thank you, Bruce. I know you were uncomfortable with this whole thing, but it means a lot that you let me go through with it.”

Bruce sighed and shook his head. “You’re right about one thing: what we’re doing is different than what your cousin and I normally do.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So Zod's invasion pretty much follows the plot of Man of Steel. There are some differences that will be revealed along the road. In case anybody ends up wondering how Kara could possibly have taken down someone like Zod, the important thing to remember is that not only is she fresh off a jump-started solar flare, so her powers are slightly stronger than usual, she also has decades of battle experience with them - far more than Kal or Zod - and caught him completely by surprise. The point of Kara stepping in was that she wanted to reduce collateral damage and finish the fight as soon as possible. Anyway, hope you guys enjoyed it, and thank you for the lovely comments!


	5. Justification

Alex had started to accept the fact that she lived in a world of science fiction. Like most people, the world’s greatest hero since the Justice Society of America admitting to basically being Alien Jesus had been the first step. It was just a sort of fact that everyone lived with now. Aliens were real, and one lived among us - cool, now would you like fries with that? Then she found out that her parents were actually friends with Alien Jesus, and that they were adopting his younger cousin who used to be older but got trapped outside of time for twenty-four years.

That had taken some getting used to.

She thought, by now, she could handle whatever other craziness came with living with Kara, but then she got sick and started rambling about what Alex was pretty sure were people and events that wouldn’t happen for years to come and before she even really had a chance to wrap her head around whether that was at all possible, more of Kara’s people suddenly decided to invade Earth and terraform the planet into a new Krypton. 

Listening to the man on the television threaten Superman and sitting with Kara once the power came back and reports started flooding in about Zod’s forces and Superman’s efforts to stop them made Alex realise just how lucky they were that Kara and her cousin were, at their cores, good people. None of them slept, spending the entire time in the living room, nervously waiting for what might very well have been the end of the world until Kara grunted ever so softly, rising to her feet. Alex tried to follow after her, but her body had been feeling heavier and heavier as time passed until it was starting to get hard to breathe. She wondered if this was what a panic attack felt like, but managed to turn her head to see Dad pinned to his recliner while Mom shakily gripped the doorway in the kitchen. 

Suddenly, the weight pressing down on her lifted, and Alex didn’t even have time to open her mouth before Kara was gone. Her mom was freaking out, muttering to herself as she paced around the house, and Dad gave Alex a long, knowing look. She had been doubting the whole time travel theory as the invasion went on and Kara sat completely still on the sofa, not moving a millimeter, but when Superman arrived outside their house less than an hour after Kara left, a pained expression on his face, Alex wondered if, maybe, this was what Kara had potentially come back to stop.

“What happened?” Dad asked as they ran outside to greet him. “Clark?”

So Superman’s name was Clark? Lame.

Clark opened and closed his mouth trying to find the right words. “Is Kara here?” He asked.

“No,” Mom cried, tears welling in her eyes. “She just took off a little under an hour ago. We have no idea where she went.”

“We were hoping you would know, actually,” Dad added.

Clark looked supremely uncomfortable and it was kind of strange to see Superman acting like that, unable to meet any of their eyes. “I had just destroyed the World Engine off the Chinese coast and was on my way back to Metropolis,” he explained. “When I got there, I saw her. S-she was fighting Zod.”

Mom let out something like a mix between a sob and a scream, and Alex felt like a ball of ice had been dropped in her gut. 

“Is she. . .” Dad couldn’t finish the question, but didn’t need to as Clark’s face hardened.

“She beat him,” he muttered. “I got back in time to see her throw him down from the atmosphere.”

“H-How is that possible?” Mom muttered.

Clark shook his head. “I don’t know. It took me years to master my powers. . . but Zod’s forces seemed to get the hang of them extremely quickly as well, something about their training as soldiers helping them.”

“But Kara’s not a soldier,” Mom argued. “She’s just a girl.”

Clark scowled. “I think there’s a lot about Kara we don’t know.”

“What do you mean?” Dad asked.

Clark took a deep breath, his throat bobbing as he swallowed. “She killed him. Didn’t even hesitate.”

“I-I don’t understand. . .” Mom whispered. 

“Kryptonians value sentient life above all else,” Clark recited, a look of disgust on his face. “We don’t kill.”

“Is that what you think?” They all whipped around to see Kara floating down, dressed in a large t-shirt with the Gotham Knights’ basketball logo across its front and a too-big pair of basketball shorts. Her expression was serious and made her look far older than she was. “How do you think Krypton became the greatest society in our cluster? Before our planet started dying, we were conquerors, Kal-El.”

Clark’s eyes widened and he stepped back before straightening. “That doesn’t make what you did right, Kara.”

“I never said it did,” Kara replied. “I will carry the death of Dru-Zod with me until I meet him again in Rao’s embrace. But the fact of the matter is that he wanted to exterminate the humans to build a new Krypton, and I happen to like some of them.”

“I could have handled him, Kara,” Clark argued. “You didn’t have to -”

“I don’t need to explain myself to you Kal-El,” Kara interrupted. She turned to face Mom and smiled apologetically. “I’m sorry for worrying you all. I understand if, after all this, you want me to leave, but I’d ask that you allow me to pray for Zod and his men’s swift return to Rao’s light first.”

Mom looked lost for words, but Alex saw the genuine fear in Kara’s eyes and stepped forward, grabbing her hand. “I’m with you.” Tears gathered in Kara’s eyes and she smiled as she led Alex through the house to the backyard and the cliff overlooking the ocean. Alex watched as Kara lowered herself to her knees, raised her head and leaned back to face the sun, her eyes closed as she murmured in Kryptonese. Her tears started flowing, and Alex waited until she opened her eyes before lowering herself next to Kara and wrapping an arm around her shoulder.

“You must think I’m some kind of monster,” Kara whispered.

“I don’t really know what to think,” Alex admitted, tightening her grip anyway. “I just know that you look like you’re hurting, and I want to make that stop.”

Kara took a deep sigh and leaned back slightly, looking her in the eye. The light from the sun made her hair look as if it was made of fire. “Zod was a product of Krypton’s past,” she explained. “It hurts to be reminded of how violent my people used to be.”

“So you really were conquerors?” Alex asked carefully. She had just walked into a minefield and was a little wary of accidentally insulting Kara’s entire race.

Kara nodded and turned to face the sun. “No great civilization has ever really expanded without violence,” she said softly. “Just look at the history of your people. Kryptonians liked to believe themselves above all the violence and bloodshed - we even sent our sector’s Green Lantern away, determined that we could police ourselves - our conquests were taught as us ‘uplifting’ other planets, the Military Guild was only ever meant to defend Krypton and our allies. But my aunt was a general, like Zod. I remember the fear that people showed when they looked at her, and she didn’t even have any powers.” Kara scowled, an expression of disgust. “I remember being  _ proud _ that my aunt made people react like that. When Krypton started dying, it meant the end for us, but to many races, I’m willing to bet it was the best news they had ever heard.” She sighed and Alex thought she had never seen anyone look more exhausted. “Kal grew up here. Much as I hate to admit it, he’ll never really understand our people. Because of that, he didn’t understand the kind of fury Zod was going to unleash on Metropolis and the rest of the world. It had to be me.”

“I’m sorry you feel that way, Kara,” Superman’s deep rumble made Alex almost jump out of her skin. She hadn’t heard him coming at all. The two of them turned to find he was practically looming over them, arm’s the size of Alex’s head crossed over his broad chest.

“It’s impolite to eavesdrop, Kal-El,” Kara replied. Alex felt her shrink into herself slightly, and shifted so that she was sitting between the two kryptonians.

“I-I won’t let you take her,” she muttered with as much bravery as she could muster. She was desperately trying not to think about the fact that this was  _ Superman  _ she was arguing with, and that there was literally nothing she could do to stop him. Superman seemed to know this as well and smiled, he might have been going for reassurance, but all it did was make Alex feel like she was being looked down upon.

“Kara, you’re right that I don’t fully understand the ways of our people. . . but we live on Earth now, and we have to follow their rules. What you did was wrong, and hopefully you will come to understand why in time.” He paused and shot a look back at her parents who nodded. “I’m not going to be taking you away from the Danvers.” Alex sagged in relief until he held up a hand to quiet them down preemptively. “But you should know, I wanted to. You risked exposing yourself, and endangered Eliza, Jeremiah, and Alex so that you could commit  _ murder.  _ It’s only due to the fact that there isn’t anywhere else to take you, that you’re going to be staying here.” His face hardened and Alex felt a jolt of fear go through her as he rose to his full height and glared down at Kara. “One chance, Kara. That’s all I’m giving you. Even if you are my cousin, if I think you’re a threat to the people of Earth, I  _ will  _ stop you.”

Without another word, he flew off, the distant pop of the sound barrier echoing through the air as Alex’s parents walked over to join them. Alex could feel Kara shaking under her arm and tightened her grip.

“Are you going to lecture her too?” Alex asked defensively.

Mom sighed and Dad ran a hand through his hair before responding. “No, we’re not.”

“Why don’t we all go inside and order some pizza,” Mom suggested. She reached for Kara’s shoulder, but Kara flinched away, burying herself into Alex’s side. Mom frowned and crouched in front of Kara, gently tugging her into a hug. “It’s alright, Sweetheart,” she soothed. “We’re not going to send you away. You don’t need to be afraid.”

Kara took a deep breath, but didn’t raise her arms to return the embrace. Instead she reached out for Alex, who grabbed her hand and squeezed it. She tried to meet her eyes and had to fight to keep her reassuring smile from slipping once she did.

Kara’s eyes, normally a bright, expressive blue, were glowing red over Mom’s shoulder. Alex had thought that she was shrinking away to protect herself in the face of her cousin’s intimidating stature, but she wasn’t. She was trying to hold herself back, seeking Alex out as some sort of anchor. Kara wasn’t afraid.

She was furious.

Alex spent the next week wondering what it was that had made Kara so angry. She was somewhat more subdued, but was as kind and gentle as Alex could ever remember her being. She didn’t follow Alex to the beach anymore, and barely left the house, choosing instead to spend most of her time on the porch or in the backyard, kneeling quietly in the sunlight. She would tense up whenever Mom or Dad got near her and sometimes, while they were eating dinner or watching TV, her eyes would flash red then yellow for the briefest moment before her expression shifted to sadness. It wasn’t until they were all sitting in the living room, watching the news as Superman fought yet another superpowered villain, and Kara suddenly shot to her feet and marched up to her room that Alex saw the expressions on her parents’ faces and figured it out.

“You’re afraid of her,” Alex accused.

“What are you talking about Alex?” Mom asked, still glancing towards the stairs up to Kara’s room.

“You’re both afraid of her,” Alex repeated. “And it’s breaking her heart.”

“Alex,” Dad began, but Alex wasn’t having any of it.

“You know she can smell it, right?” Alex asked. “She told me herself. She can smell the different chemicals in our sweat when we’re afraid. She thinks we hate her.”

“It’s okay, Alex,” Kara said quietly, having suddenly reappeared behind her. “I understand that it might be difficult to see me the same way after what I did,” she said, addressing Mom and Dad. “I did what I knew to be right, and I won’t apologize for that, but I will apologize for any danger I may have placed you in through my actions.”

“We know you think what you did was right, Kara,” Dad replied. “And maybe we’re not as. . . rigid as your cousin in terms of ethics. . .”

“It’s just going to take some time to reconcile what happened with the picture of the sweet girl we have in our minds,” Mom finished.

Kara smiled bashfully. “I guess I sometimes forget that my body didn’t age while I was in the Phantom Zone,” she admitted. Alex and her parents froze.

“You mean. . .” Mom began. “But I thought you said you were in stasis?”

“My body was, yes,” Kara replied. “The Phantom Zone is outside of objective time, but an object’s individual, subjective timeline is entangled with them at a quantum level. The matter that I am composed of didn’t age or decay, but that doesn’t mean I didn’t experience the passage of time on a more conscious level.”

Tears gathered in Alex’s eyes, even as she shared a look with her father. The hard science flew over her head, but she could still grasp the fundamentals: Kara might not have aged, but she was definitely conscious during her imprisonment. Her body was that of a fifteen year old girl, but they could only guess at how old her mind was.

Before they could ask her any further questions, Kara changed subjects, clearly uncomfortable. “I actually came down here to ask you both something,” she said, looking between Mom and Dad.

“What is it, Sweetheart?” Mom asked.

“I  _ really  _ didn’t enjoy being sick,” Kara complained, and the rest of them smiled at the look of disgust on her face. “It’s clear that without my powers, my immune system is vulnerable. I’ve been doing research, and would like to ask if you would be okay with me blowing out my powers again so that I can get vaccinated.”

“Would that even work?” Dad asked. “We don’t really know how your immune system differs from our own.”

“I read through Alex’s biology textbook, and, while yours is certainly not as. . . advanced as my own, they do work on the same basic principles,” Kara replied. “Mine simply hasn’t had a chance to adapt to the various bacteria and viruses of your planet, and I feel like I would be mocked for eternity if I rejoined my ancestors in Rao’s light, only for them to find out I was killed by a disease on a planet where I am functionally invulnerable.”

Alex snickered at that, and before she knew it the four of them were laughing uncontrollably. 

Things seemed to finally return to normal after that. Mom had acquired the necessary vaccines herself, and Kara had retreated to the basement, where they had set aside an area for her to simply start tunneling under the house with her heat vision. Alex was amazed at the consideration Kara took to collateral damage when it came to her powers, heating small sections of the floor and underlying bedrock at a time so that they didn’t wind up with a basement full of molten lava. It took a good twenty minutes, but eventually, the beams from Kara’s eyes started to flicker and lose intensity. When she had finally blown out her powers, Alex couldn’t help but laugh at the exhausted pout she had displayed as Mom gave her needle after needle.

Kara managed not to get anything more than the sniffles this time, and Alex had been surprised to find her in her room the next day, exercising.

Mom had been concerned about it, but Kara had simply waved away her concerns, stating it was the only time she could actually get a proper workout since arriving on Earth. The rest of Alex’s summer vacation passed in a familiar routine of hanging out with friends during the day, and spending the evenings with Kara and her family. Kara still didn’t go out with her anymore, but would occasionally wander into town, and Alex would see her on the street. She was ashamed of the fact that she never approached her, but Kara never brought it up, staying well away from Alex and her friends whenever they did cross paths.

Her evenings with Kara and her family ranged from simply eating dinner and hanging out in front of the TV, to star-gazing as Kara told her stories about her time among other planets. Kara had also taken to blowing out her powers every couple weeks to help develop her immune system, and after Alex had returned from one of her jiu jitsu classes, had offered to spar with her using kryptonian martial arts. Alex had yet to win any of their matches, but, unlike whenever she lost in her classes, she didn’t feel that all-too-familiar flush of shame and frustration when Kara helped her to her feet, concern in her eyes as she quickly made sure there were no injuries before calmly explaining to Alex how she had beaten her.

Before Alex knew it, summer was nearing its end, and she was participating in the annual surfing competition. Kara and her parents had come out to cheer her on as she competed against the older, more experienced kids, having long-since advanced beyond her age-bracket. With everything that had been happening recently, she had fallen behind in her practicing, and only managed to scrape by with third place. Her friends and parents offered their condolences, telling her she’d do better next year, but Kara had simply wrapped her arms around her and whispered how proud she was in her ear. She knew Alex had done her best, and didn’t expect anything more than that.

Alex had felt like her insides were going to melt, and hadn’t been sure whether to be relieved or disappointed when her friends dragged her off to celebrate the end of summer down at the pier. Her thoughts became a jumbled mess until eventually she and Kara were suddenly waiting for the bus, and Mom was giving her a lecture about how it was going to be a new and most likely challenging experience for Kara, and Alex had to watch out for her. 

Alex had wanted to roll her eyes, but she knew her mother was right. The other kids still whispered about Kara whenever they ran across her in town, and Alex knew in her bones that they were going to give her a tough time. Kara was new and different, which made her easy fodder for the other kids. She very determinedly marched to the beat of her own drum, and refused to bend for anyone. The moment she stepped onto the bus and greeted the surly driver with a bright smile and a happy good morning, she may as well have thrown herself on the ground in front of a pack of wolves.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Not a lot to say about this one. It pretty much just deals with the aftermath of Kara's beat down against Zod, and starts to hint at the more subtle changes that come with it. I started jumping ahead in time, because I have a truly massive amount of time to cover, and not a lot really happens when you keep your head down in a small town. If you have any head-canons you'd like to see in a more slice of life kinda way, lemme know in the comments, as, while I have the general story beats figured out, I really wanna flesh it out.
> 
> Anyway, thanks for reading and commenting, as always!
> 
> TTFN


	6. Education

Kara’s first experience with high school had been a nightmare. She had been bullied relentlessly for everything from how she dressed to the inhuman amounts of food she needed to get through the day. Alex had, for the most part, avoided her at the time, only to comfort her when she got home. The year after Alex had gone to college had been downright hellish, and Kara had graduated from Midvale High without having made a single friend.

This time, however, Kara had the advantage of perspective. She had grown up and, frankly, had a lot more on her mind than caring what some insecure teenagers thought of her. She was thankful that Jeremiah and Eliza had allowed her to enroll in the same grade as Alex, but she was determined to not be a burden like she had the first time. Alex’s own social life had suffered when they were in high school, and her life had been more of a downward spiral afterwards until she joined the DEO, so Kara was determined to let her have as normal a life as she could until they both graduated and she could start moving forward with her more public plans. If Alex decided she still wanted to fight by Kara’s side then, Kara would happily let her, but she was determined to at least make sure that, this time around, Alex got that choice.

With that in mind, she cheerfully got on the bus, greeting the driver by force of habit, and ignored the stares coming from the other kids as she made her way to the free seat at the back. One boy stuck his leg out in an attempt to trip her, and she calmly stepped over it, not sparing him a glance. Alex was invited to sit with one of her friends, and shot Kara a look before accepting. Kara simply smiled and leaned back in her seat, allowing her senses to expand and retract in a sort of meditative state until someone plopped down in the seat across the aisle from hers. She turned to look at the newcomer, a girl who she guessed might have been in the grade above her, and who looked like a Barbie doll come to life.

“So, you’re the new kid, huh?” She asked, chewing loudly on a piece of gum.

“I am,” Kara replied, reaching into her bag and pulling out one of the high-calorie protein bars she had convinced Jeremiah to buy for her. “My name’s Kara.”

“Is it true you’re friends with that creepy homeless guy outside the mall?” The girl asked. Other kids were turning to watch the confrontation, and Kara could feel Alex’s eyes on her as she spoke with one of her friends near the front of the bus. “The one with all those freaky scars?”

“I enjoy spending time with Tom from time to time,” Kara said. The girl sitting behind the one speaking to her leaned forward and whispered her friend’s ear.

“Bet you she’s fucking him or something.”

Both girls giggled and Kara rolled her eyes and turned away, pulling her sketchbook out of her bag. She ignored the girls, keeping a straight face as the Barbie wannabe tried to get her attention. Finally the bus arrived at school, and Kara paused only to briefly smile at Alex before making her way to the principal’s office where she received her schedule. She was happier than she should have been to see she shared her math and science classes with Alex in the afternoon, and headed off to her art class in a better mood. No one wanted to sit with Kara in Art or English afterwards, but that was fine by her, as they were the only two that required even a modicum of focus. Her brain was basically programmed for Math and Science, so she wasn’t worried about those as she grabbed another protein bar from her bag to go with the lunch she bought at the cafeteria. 

She was balancing her food in one hand and the book she was reading on economics in the other when her tray was slapped to the ground.

“Oh, sorry,” a burly boy with a trace of whiskers on his upper lips cooed. He wore a green letterman jacket, showing he was one of the jocks in school. “Was that your lunch?”

Kara leaned down and picked up her protein bar. “No worries,” she said cordially. “I wasn’t watching where I was going either.” She quickly stepped around the jock and made her way to an empty table where she sat down and continued reading her book. A football bounced off her head at one point, but she hardly even felt it. She could have easily dodged it, just like the hand that had slapped her food to the ground, but with Jeremiah and Eliza more paranoid about her being discovered than the first time around, she couldn’t risk it. 

Besides, these were just a bunch of children trying to make themselves feel better by tearing her down. It may have been torture when she experienced it the first time, but, having been actually tortured - both physically and psychologically - this was now a walk in the park. That being said, it still warmed her heart when she smelled the anger coming off of Alex as she marched across the cafeteria and took a seat at the same table as her.

“You could at least defend yourself,” she muttered harshly, stabbing a french fry with her fork. “Ben is never going to leave you alone if he thinks you’re an easy target.”

Kara smiled and shook her head. “None of them are worth the risk.”

“I’m not saying you have to, like, throw him into the moon,” Alex said, hands waving energetically. “Just. . . don’t let him push you around.”

“This isn’t my first choice either,” Kara replied, keeping her voice steady even as she allowed her eyes to warm up and briefly flash with what she was feeling. “But it is the one that keeps everyone safe.” If she momentarily lost control of her anger while fighting a criminal it was one thing, but these were children, and she wasn’t about to allow herself to risk hurting them so she could make herself feel better in the moment.

Alex’s expression changed from anger to sadness to understanding as she reached over and took her hand. “Sit with me in class?” She asked, changing the subject as she slid her tray between them and shared her food. Kara beamed and nodded, her heart fluttering at the way Alex described the various students around the cafeteria like they were characters in a soap opera. After lunch they walked together to Math, where Kara kept one ear on the lesson so she didn’t make a fool out of herself, but otherwise ignored what was going on. On top of having already passed these classes once before, her mind had been designed to handle equations and theories on a level Earth wouldn’t reach for some time yet. She would still run calculations for Alex whenever asked, but that was more a matter of processing and enjoying the slight challenge than genuine desire. She largely left the science stuff to Alex and Winn, and focused her attention on using her powers to help others. 

With Alex’s stink eye holding any distractions at bay, Kara was free to consider her next step. She spent the rest of the day formulating and dismissing plans. The first world-wide threat she would need taken care of was Myriad - or, to be precise, Non and Indigo. The timeline may have changed drastically, but there were always constants: the Guardians were a bunch of self-righteous cowards, and Darkseid wanted to take over the multiverse and create his own version of hell. Those were universal facts going back almost to the dawn of time and pretty much guaranteed that the War of Lights and the Apokalips Crisis would happen sooner or later - it was a simple matter of changing outcomes to minimize the damage done.

Smaller constants existed as well. Her fight against Zod had altered the timeline in way she couldn’t possibly predict, to the point where Myriad may never get activated (a long shot considering Aunt Astra had been working on it since before she was imprisoned, but Kara could dream), but it didn’t change the fact that Non was a power-hungry bastard and Indigo was just plain  _ nuts _ . The same held true for scores of other people as well. Changes in the events that shaped them were inevitable, but the person underneath could only be altered so much.

With her mind occupied with the idea of how far-reaching the consequences of her actions could be, Kara stumbled across her next step. Bruce Wayne was an impressive asset and resource to have on her side, but he was only one man, and he had his own city to protect on top of helping her. She needed someone to help connect her to the goings on around the world.

Somehow, Kara needed Cat Grant.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I remember hearing once that if an adult wound up back in high school, it could almost be guaranteed that they wouldn't be popular, because they have the perspective that teenagers don't. Kara is old, she's fully embraced all that cliched adult advice we all hated hearing while growing up, plus she has the literal end of the world to think about - something I imagine would be pretty distracting for most people. I considered having her react in some way, not because of the bullying itself, but because she's got some understandable trauma, but I think it makes more sense for her to just be a master of compartmentalization at this point. She's still a giant ball of sunshine and rage, but she's got a better handle on it.


	7. Assistance

It took a solid week of covertly sneaking out and flying to Gotham to convince Bruce to set aside his general distrust of anyone not named Alfred Pennyworth and agree that they could benefit from having an easily accessible source of information.

It took two weeks to convince him that Cat Grant was that source.

At this point in the timeline, Cat was still building CatCo into the media empire it would one day become. Carter had to be two or three by now, and Adam was better not thought about at all. Kara had then spent the last week of September trying to figure out how to best approach Cat.

The amount of support and guidance Cat had given her when she first started as Supergirl, and the drama surrounding Kara’s unwillingness to admit her identity despite Cat clearly knowing, were good reasons to be upfront with her. The only question was how upfront? Coming in guns blazing with the whole time-travel all-of-existence-is-in-peril thing wouldn’t work the same way it did for Bruce. There was a long list of horrible things that Kara might still end up carrying the blame for through her inaction if nothing else, and Kara didn’t think anyone else was really damaged enough to shoulder that burden without it crushing them. 

Eventually the frustration was getting to her, and, as Kara waited for Alex to finish studying for their upcoming test on polynomial equations and go to bed, she decided to just wing it.

“It’s really not fair how easy this stuff is for you,” Alex grouched from her place on Kara’s bed where she was pouring over her notes.

Kara rolled her eyes and smiled as she floated herself over Alex, reading her notes over her shoulder. “You had this stuff figured out before my first week on your planet,” she countered.

“Then why can’t I get any of this to stick?!” Alex groaned, burying her head in Kara’s blanket. “I’m doomed!”

“Maybe if you stop thinking about how pretty Vicki Donahue is, you’d be able to concentrate,” Kara accused. If Kara were completely honest with herself, she’d agree that there was more than a little bit of jealousy behind that statement. Vicki Donahue was the stereotypical popular girl personified. She used her looks and popularity to manipulate the other students - even going so far as to use Alex’s crush on her to do better in school. Unfortunately, Kara couldn’t really do anything about it without hurting Alex as well, and convincing her to accept herself more than a decade ahead of schedule was hard enough already. 

Alex’s head shot up, her face bright red as she spluttered her denials while frantically looking around to see if anyone was listening. Kara sighed and smiled reassuringly. “Alex, you know your parents won’t care if you like boys or girls. They love you for who you are.”

“You don’t know that!” Alex hissed. “If word got out -”

Kara’s shoulders drooped. As predicted, Kara had been instantly labeled a loser throughout their high school. She was seen as an easy target since she couldn’t risk fighting back and acted nothing like a teenage girl should - being not only far more mature, but also completely unconcerned with what anyone thought of her. Alex, however, was smart, popular, and very much concerned with the opinions of her peers. Kara might not care what they thought of her, but that didn’t mean she was unfamiliar with the cruelty of children.

“Besides,” Alex huffed. “I don’t like Vicki like. . .  _ that.  _ We’re just friends. I. . . I like boys.”

Kara smiled sadly and wrapped Alex in a hug. As much as she wanted Alex to accept herself, she knew it couldn’t be forced. The most she could do was make sure Alex knew she was there for her, and would still be whenever she was ready.

_ While I’m at it, though. . . _

Kara got off the bed, ignoring Alex’s curious calls after her, and walked down the stairs towards where Jeremiah and Eliza were sitting together on the couch, watching TV. They looked up when she entered and muted the show when she came to a stop in front of them.

“Is there something you need, Kara?” Eliza asked, curiosity and the slightest bit of concern shining in her eyes.

“It didn’t occur to me that I would need to explain this when I came to Earth,” Kara confessed, rehashing her original coming out from her old life. “But after seeing how humans act towards one another and doing the requisite research, I thought it best to inform you both so that no false assumptions or surprises happen in the future.”

“What are you talking about, Kara?” Jeremiah asked, his expression serious.

“On Krypton, children were born in pods using genetic material from both parents,” Kara explained. “As a result, the sex of those involved was never an issue.”

“Kara,” Eliza muttered. “Are you trying to tell us. . .”

“I am attracted to females as well as males,” Kara finished. “I understand that Earth seems to be quite prejudiced against those who -”

Kara never got a chance to finish as Jeremiah wrapped his arms around her, Eliza not far behind.

“Thank you, Kara, for sharing with us,” Eliza muttered.

“You should know we don’t think any less of you,” Jeremiah added. “We still love you, no matter who you fall in love with.”

Kara smiled and settled down on the couch with them, watching  _ Jeopardy  _ with them as she listened to Alex creep back up the stairs and grab her school things before retreating to her room. She wasn’t going to make Alex come out, but the least she could do was prove that, in the safety of her own home, she was free to be herself whenever she was ready to accept that. 

Kara returned to her own room and meditated until everyone else had fallen asleep. The mental exercise helped her deal with the army of demons running around in her head while providing her body with the rest it needed, if at a slower rate than sleeping properly. Once the Danvers were asleep and she had scanned the area and upper atmosphere for anyone watching her, Kara floated out the window and quietly soared towards National City.

CatCo Plaza was still little more than a plan in the back of Cat’s mind at the moment, so it took Kara a few minutes of scanning the city to find her. Cat was sitting in her office on the top floor of a modest, by Cat Grant standards, twenty floor building in the East end of the city. Kara watched and listened through the wall with a fond smile as Cat snarled into a phone, threatening whoever was on the other end with termination if they didn’t get their act together. Carter must have been with his father at the moment, as Cat didn’t have the typical scowl she normally wore when she was forced to work late and leave him at home with the nanny.

Cat’s office in this building didn’t have a balcony, so Kara had to settle for sheepishly knocking on the window to get her attention. She smiled when Cat shot out of her seat and whirled around, waving when the sharp eyes that had long ago stopped terrifying her, and now only filled her with a sense of longing, met her own.

“Great, now I’m seeing things,” Cat sighed, running a hand through her hair. “Note to self: fire the assistant, and schedule another appointment with Lindsay.”

Kara snickered and shook her head. She looked around the side of the building for some way inside before using her superspeed to bust through the roof access and down the maintenance stairs, appearing outside Cat’s office in about a second.

“I’m not a hallucination, Miss Grant,” she said, smiling through the bundle of nerves coiled up in her chest.

“If that’s true, strange, flying girl,” Cat replied, looking her up and down. “Then you are trespassing.”

“I’m sorry,” Kara said, nervously twitching her fingers. “I just. . . needed to speak with you.”

“I have plenty of fans,” Cat said dryly. “Why should I talk with you?”

Kara took a deep breath and steeled herself. “Because I’m Superman’s cousin.” Cat scoffed and rolled her eyes, so Kara fired a weak beam of heat vision at the cold coffee sitting on the corner of her desk. Cat froze at the display, her thinking face on display.

“Well, you’ve convinced me not to call security,” she drawled. “Not that I dare say they could really do anything if you didn’t want them to. But you still haven’t answered my question: why are you here? If you are cousins with that harpy Lane’s flying boy scout, you should know that he’s notoriously tight lipped when it comes to the media.”

Kara smiled at the dig towards Lois, and awkwardly looked around the office. “Can. . . can I sit down?” She asked, indicating the couch sitting against the far wall of Cat’s office. Cat sighed and rolled her eyes, but waved her towards it anyway. Kara smiled and took a seat while Cat retreated behind her desk, before continuing. “I came to ask for your help, Miss Grant.”

It was manipulative, but Kara knew that she only had so long to use the helpless-little-girl angle, and she was going to make the most of it.

“What could someone like you need from me that your cousin can’t provide?” Cat asked, her tone softening just a hair.

“My cousin and I. . . don’t exactly get along, Miss Grant,” Kara confessed. “He would never agree to something like this.”

Cat’s eyebrow rose, her curiosity clearly piqued. “Go on, Miss. . .”

“Zor-El. Kara Zor-El.”

“Go on, Miss Zor-El.”

“Your world looks at my cousin and they see a savior,” Kara explained. “But I think many of you forget that we’re refugees.”

“Yes, the whole doomed planet side of your cousin’s story does seem to fall by the wayside an awful lot,” Cat agreed. “People would rather read about the latest plane that he’s caught, or what have you. Not that he ever really talks about his past, anyway.”

“It might not look like it, Miss Grant, but I’m actually older than my cousin,” Kara continued. “I was supposed to raise him and take care of him when we arrived on Earth. My pod only left minutes after his, but that was enough of a delay for the explosion of our planet to throw me off course. When I arrived, he was already grown and flying around with the symbol of our house on his chest.”

Kara allowed that old, familiar ache to show through and Cat’s eyes lost some of their edge as she thought about the implications to Kara’s words. 

“I can’t even begin to understand how that must have felt,” she offered quietly.

Kara smiled and nodded her head in thanks. “The reason I want your help, Miss Grant, is because my cousin and I aren’t the only refugees to land on your planet. Earth has hosted extraterrestrial life since long before your species even considered the possibility of life beyond your own world. Recently, though, it has become more dangerous than ever. The governments of the world hunt aliens and would treat all of them as invaders, here to enslave or destroy you, when many of us simply want a chance to live in peace.”

“And you want me to tell your story to, what, advocate for alien rights?” Cat asked.

“Not my story,” Kara replied. “My cousin and I are lucky enough to pass as humans. Most aren’t. I want you to investigate the non-superhero aliens living in National City. Tell their stories, learn about their cultures, earn their trust. Your country’s Department of Extranormal Operations acts without oversight to hunt down, kill, and detain aliens without cause. It needs to stop.”

“You’re asking for quite a bit from one reporter, Miss Zor-El,” Cat said, though Kara could see the fire starting to burn in her eyes. “Us humans can barely tolerate each other at the best of times. Aliens might be asking the common people a bit much.”

“You’re Cat Grant,” Kara said by way of explanation. “Future Queen of All Media. If anyone can do it, you can.” 

"And why do you think I would even want to go against the governments of the world, Miss Zor-El?" Cat asked shrewdly. "It seems like an awfully big risk to take."

"Aside from the opportunity to get the scoop on a story nobody is even aware of yet?" Kara asked. Cat maintained her poker face, but Kara could see the interest burning in her gaze. "How does CatCo's very own superhero to rival the Daily Planet sound?"

Cat didn't say anything for several minutes, standing up and walking around her desk once more to look Kara up and down. Eventually, she smiled, her expression downright predatory. "Very well, Miss Zor-El, you have a deal. I expect I'll have to wait until your legal by Earth standards before I can start cashing in on National City's own superhero?"

Kara nodded. "It really means a lot, Miss Grant. You won't regret it. Besides," her expression grew somber and she pinned Cat with her gaze. “One day, an actual threat is going to come to your planet, and I can tell you now: if you can’t stand together, Earth will be doomed.” Kara rose to her feet and reached her hand out to shake Cat’s, smiling to clear the air. “And maybe consider getting an office with a balcony. Never know when a little birdie will have a story to tell you.”

With Cat’s ambitions stoked, Kara zoomed out of the building and flew over the city quickly arriving at the nameless bar she and her friends would frequent in her old timeline and trying not to think about the memories of the streets around her littered with bodies. She arrived at the bar, and knocked, shaking her dark thoughts away as the hatch on the door slid open.

“Get out of here, Kid,” a deep voice grumbled.

“I have a message for M’gann,” Kara replied. The person behind the door hesitated so she plowed along. “Tell her that she’s probably going to hear about a cat sniffing around sometime soon. It’s noisy, but it just wants to help some out-of-towners, and is under the protection of the last daughter of Krypton and Scion of the House of El.”

The eyes behind the hatch widened and their pupils became slits, but Kara took off right away. She returned to Midvale and sat outside Alex’s window for the rest of the night.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> While they're still children, I'm trying to use the Kalex scenes to sort of 'humanize' Kara. Yeah, she traveled back in time and has the weight of the multiverse on her shoulders, but while she still can, she's determined to do right by Alex. Anyway, we've finally met Cat. Kara's always worked better alongside others, so I figured it would make sense that she would basically spend her pre-superhero years just rebuilding her support structure. Also, it was sort of a blink-and-you'll-miss-it scene, but considering Kara's taken the mantle of Nightwing (something I'll get into more once the other Kryptonians make an appearance), how do you think Cat's going to react to her newly-minted superhero being a little. . . darker, than her cousin in Metropolis? How will Dick Grayson react?  
> With that said, thanks for reading and commenting!  
> TTFN


	8. Introspection

Sometimes Alex just couldn’t understand Kara. In the two weeks since Kara had come out to Mom and Dad, Alex’s mind had been a whirlwind of frustration and confusion. Even though she had done it as a means of reassuring Alex that her parents would accept her no matter what, all Kara’s confession had done was take away her safety net. Without the worry of what her parents might think, Alex was being forced to actually think about things she had been doing a perfectly good job at avoiding. She had tried to fall back on the jealousy she had felt towards Kara when she had first arrived. Told herself that of course Mom and Dad would accept Kara no matter what, she was an alien. On top of that, she was basically perfect in every way. One of the smartest people on the planet, well-mannered, and heartbreakingly beautiful. 

But that had only lasted until they were having a little bonfire in the backyard and Kara had lit it with her heat vision before Dad had a chance to strike a match. She had seen how her parents stiffened, and knew from the way Kara’s nostrils had flared that she could smell their lingering fear towards her casual use of her powers and the reminder that she was adept enough with them to  _ kill  _ another kryptonian with relative ease. Alex’s grip on her jealousy had slipped as she watched her parents pretend nothing was wrong while Kara pretended her heart wasn’t breaking.

That left her dangling over a ravine of self-reflection. Alex was forced to examine her actions honestly, and it made her miserable. Combined with the stress of midterms approaching, she had taken to lashing out. There had been several screaming matches with Mom, and Dad was walking on eggshells around the both of them. Kara was the worst, though. She hurled insult after insult at her, blaming Kara for everything that was wrong with her life, and Kara simply stood there and took it. Alex could see the pain she was causing in Kara’s eyes, and would feel a corrosive ball of guilt in her gut, but then Kara would smile that infuriatingly beautiful smile of hers, full of understanding and compassion, and the guilt would be replaced with all sorts of feelings Alex couldn’t even begin to name, so she defaulted back to anger.

Despite all of that, Alex still woke up almost every morning to find Kara sitting on the roof outside her window, scanning around the house with her enhanced senses for any threats. It was as she was watching Kara do this, the light of the sun just cresting over the house and wreathing her in golden fire while she sat in front of the deep blue-green of the ocean that Alex felt the depth of Kara’s strange loyalty towards her. While she was pretty sure it was because of whatever knowledge of the future Kara had gleaned while trapped in the Phantom Zone, Alex couldn’t, for the life of her, imagine just what it was she would end up doing in the future to make Kara look at her the way she did. The way she was always there for Alex, the easy affection she showed towards Alex, the way she teased Alex about Vicki. . .

_ Oh. . . _

_ Wait. . . _

If Kara knew about the future, then that meant. . .

But if that was the case, why didn’t she say anything?

_ Right. No spoilers. _

Was that why she was. . .

And if Kara knew about it, then she was. . .

Alex choked on a sob and stumbled back towards her bed. Rules of time travel or not, all the evidence pointed towards only one conclusion:

She was. . .

Warm arms wrapped around her and Alex allowed herself to be carried back to her bed, where she curled into the soothing heat in front of her while soft trills filled her ears and gentle fingers stroked her hair. 

“Kara,” Alex whimpered, unable to raise her head, but confident she could still be heard. “I. . . I’m. . .”

“I know,” Kara whispered. “You don’t have to tell anybody until you’re ready, though. As long as you’re honest with yourself.”

Alex fell apart and cried into Kara’s chest for the next thirty minutes before tiring herself out. When she reawoke, Kara was the one curled up in her arms, and the trilling purrs she released were louder than ever, rumbling through her own body. She laid there, feeling strangely unburdened and watched Kara sleep. It was a rare thing to see, considering how little rest Kara needed compared to humans, and Alex cherished the idea that she was trusted enough to see Kara at her most vulnerable.

Normally, Kara was hyper-aware of her surroundings - which, considering her heightened senses covered anywhere from the entire western seaboard to the whole planet - she wasn’t jumpy or nervous, but she took a moment to analyze every room before she entered. There was a constant crinkle in her brow that would deepen on occasion when she seemed to become lost in thought and that Alex had the strangest urge to run her fingers over to smooth it out. Now, as Kara burrowed herself further into Alex’s chest, it was nowhere to be seen, and Alex was once again reminded that, despite Kara being nigh indestructible, paradoxically she was also more fragile than the average human. The thought filled Alex with a swirling nebula of feelings that she would have trouble identifying even if she wasn’t already emotionally exhausted, so she did what she always did and shoved them aside for what she told herself was later analysis - promising herself in the meantime that she wouldn’t act like a giant bitch and take it out on Kara this time.

The creak of her door opening startled Alex and she sucked in a breath, whipping around to find Kara up and already floating between her and Dad, who had come to check on them, all the tension from before returning as Kara scanned their surroundings before landing softly on the floor and turning back to face Dad.

“I’m sorry, Jeremiah,” she whispered. “You startled me.”

“No,” Dad croaked, clearing his throat as he looked between the two of them before settling on Alex. “You’re mom sent me to ask if you’d like to have brunch with us.”

“Brunch sounds great, Dad,” Alex replied, slipping off the bed and walking around Kara, grabbing her wrist and stroking it with her thumb. “We’ll be right down.”

Dad shot one more glance at Kara and nodded stiffly, backing out the room but leaving the door open. Alex rolled her eyes and turned back to Kara, grabbing her other hand and repeating the soothing motion until the red and yellow light swirling in Kara’s eyes faded back to her usual blue.

“It must suck being a light sleeper with your senses,” Alex said sympathetically.

“I’m not,” Kara mumbled, a flash of violet and orange appearing in her eyes as she avoided Alex’s gaze. Alex wanted to press further, ask what exactly Kara meant by that, but could tell now wasn’t the time. Instead, she chose to distract Kara with one of her favourite non-food related pastimes: indulging the Danvers family’s curiosity concerning anything and everything extraterrestrial.

“What do the colours represent?” Alex asked as she gently led Kara downstairs. “I know they correspond with emotions that you’re feeling, but I still haven’t figured out which is which yet.”

“Our eyes glow corresponds with the seven fundamental emotions,” Kara explained. “Rage, desire, fear, will, hope, compassion, and love.”

“Those are. . . broad definitions of emotion,” Mom reasoned as she served Alex her pancakes.

“There’s a degree of nuance to it,” Kara replied. “For example, orange is the colour of desire. This could mean anything from greed, to hunger, to lust.”

“I wonder how it works,” Dad muttered. “Is it a reaction of different hormones in the eyes?”

“And what regulates them enouroduce such varied outputs in wavelength?” Mom added.

“Hormones activate a release of solar radiation that is stored in our bodies,” Kara confirmed. “It’s the basis for our heat vision when under the blessing of Sol. However, the various colours come from our connection to the emotional electromagnetic spectrum. It is fueled by the collective emotions of all sentient beings in the universe.”

“The emotional electromagnetic spectrum?” Alex repeated.

Kara nodded slicing into her fifth pancake with ease. “All sentient photo-communicative species use it, though some with more complexity than others. And there are devices that can be fueled by it as well. The Green Lantern Corps uses one to channel the green light of willpower to make themselves stronger and faster, as well as allowing them to create solid-light constructs of whatever they can imagine.”

“You’ve mentioned the Green Lanterns before,” Alex noted. “You said your people sent them away.”

“The Green Lantern Corps act as a sort of intergalactic law enforcement throughout the wider universe,” Kara explained. “Krypton felt they would be better off policing their sector themselves and dismissed their Green Lantern, for all the good that did them.” Alex could tell there was more there but left it for now.

“So, it’s like the Force?” She asked instead. “With, like, a - well, not  _ light _ \- but a good side and a bad side?”

Kara shrugged. “That’s way too philosophical for Saturday brunch,” she mumbled, avoiding the question as she looked at the rolled up newspaper on the table next to Dad. “Are you reading that?”

Mom and Dad exchanged a look, but Kara had already grabbed it, flipping it open and revealing the headline and making Alex gasp.

“What?” Kara asked, closing the paper before looking down at it. Sprawled across the front page was a picture of a stern-looking woman in expensive clothes walking down the street and above it were the words:

_ CAT GRANT: MEDIA QUEEN OR CONSPIRACY NUT? _

The article was about another article that Cat Grant had apparently written where she pointed out the likelihood that Superman was not the only alien living on Earth. Kara scanned the article in less than a second and scoffed.

“Well, that’s just mean,” she grumbled. “I read Miss Grant’s article and it was very well-researched. Not some crackpot internet conspiracy.”

“Kara, do you know what this means?” Alex hissed. “What if this draws attention to you?”

“You and your family will be fine, Alex,” Kara reassured her, completely missing the point as she gathered her dishes and stood up. “But you are right that this will draw more attention. I should probably get Tom out of town before anyone notices his fins.” She cleaned her dishes at super speed before appearing next to Mom and kissing her on the cheek. “Thank you for brunch, Eliza, it was delicious. I’ll be back before the end of the day!”

“Kara, wait!” Alex cried after her, but the door had already slammed shut.

“Alex,” Dad groaned. “Who’s Tom?”

“And why does he have fins?” Mom added.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry for the long delay. I've recently found myself a job, and between it and school, I've been a little burnt out. You can also blame that for why this chapter is so short and doesn't really go anywhere. I like alternating between Kara and Alex, but it's not unfair to say that until she grows up a bit more into the badass that she can be, Alex is mostly along for the ride, and thus unable to move many things forward. I do have a sort of subplot involving her, Kara, and Vicki in the works, but I didn't have the motivation to really get started on it. As a result, this chapter is more of my way of saying that I'm still here for the time being, but updates will be sparser than when I first started out.  
> Anyway, as always, thanks for reading and commenting. I love reading your thoughts and predictions, and it does seriously get me more motivated than anything else to know people actually want to keep reading what I write.  
> TTFN


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